Training to plaintiffs

It was a rainy day, the “gold horn” views from the classroom (Heinrich Böell foundation) were amazing and the turkish coffee didn´t seem so turkish because there were a messy mixture of several nationalities people. We started to arrive, everybody had done de homework: the powerpoint were almost finish, the arguments seemed convincing, the speeches were moderated but elaborated. Today the first "workshop" was celebrated with the plaintiffs that are going to present their lawsuits at the Tribunal.

The plaintiffs came from Munzur, from Ilisuf and from Yusufeli, three Turkey valleys that have a same problem: autochthon population refuse the installation of tree big hydroelectric dams. It was necessary to underline the importance of a scientific and technical speech, and the relationships between the evidence and the legal consolidation (There are so many Declarations, Convenants, Charts and international principles about environment that they should be used, doesn´t it?) The theatrical feature of trial process is also important: it doesn´t mind if the jury already knows which the arguments parts are, both, plaintiff and accused, must perform to convince the members of the jury and… to make public their problem. In fact, is the public opinion effect of the verdict one of the consequences of the trial. Today the training was a good experience.

Just it was necessary to improve the way the speeches shall be shown in public. The plaintiffs talked about sacred sources, ethnological traditions, huge biodiversity or incredible patrimony, but there weren’t graphic examples of that. Does a photographe serve? Maybe it is not a evidence, but it helps, we trust that photoshop hadn´t been used…We live in the image society, (somebody has a doubt?): “sometimes a image serve more than thousand words”, say Alexander…, one of the instruction juries. Using a map to show the foreigner members of the jury where the hot point is and how the hidraulical network of the region is becomes also very practical…

One of the main achieves of Latinoamerican Water Tribunal (nowadays International Water Tribunal) is that it invites to de accused to answer the lawsuit and to argument its principles. Sometimes there is no answer of the big corporation or government, but sometimes there is. Today we had the chance of reading the Werner Schmied (an Austrich Bank) response to a query: “all the construction works at Ilisu has HEEP have been suspended in order to give the necessary time for completion of environmental, social and cultural heritage activities to fulfil the international standars…-the bank etter says- please do not hesitate to contact us for any further questions…”